In the international market, parts and components are regularly manufactured in one country and shipped to other countries. For example, parts and components may be manufactured in a first country and delivered to a plurality of other countries, or may be manufactured in a first country, shipped to a second country for assembly with other parts and components, and then the assembled product shipped to yet a third country. Basically, there is no limit to the number of countries that may ship or receive parts or components from an initial country.
During the international shipping of parts or components, there are a plurality of import/export rules and requirements including duty, security, monitoring, etc. on the parts or components being imported and/or exported. Countries and nations throughout the world utilize these import/export rules for a plurality of financial and political purposes. In one case, the import/export rules are used to promote fair trade. In another case, the import/export rules may be used to provide money to the nation receiving the import or providing the export.
In most cases, the import/export rules required by a specific country are based on a plurality of factors including, classification of part (what the part is or what the part does), time of year, needs of the country, etc. Therefore, the import/export rules required for a specific part or component may differ at each country and may also be adjusted annually, seasonally, quarterly, etc.
Due to the differing import/export rules and associated costs, importing and/or exporting agents and companies must maintain a group of personnel whose job entails maintaining the correct part country classification including import/export rules for each part and for every country to which the part will be imported and/or exported.
One problem with human input of the part country classification information is the amount of data to be manually input. For example, a company may have hundreds of parts with each part being imported and/or exported to a plurality of countries. Moreover, each country may have different and/or changing regulations for each part. In addition, the possibility for human error when imputing the part information or classifying the part for a plurality of countries is significant. For example, a mistype of data or forgetting to complete the import and/or export information for one of the import/export countries can result in product delays, fines, and the like. Thus, it would be desirable to have a classification reference system which can resolve the above-described difficulties.